GAT_00:Infernalist: I used to think that he was doing this strictly to shore up support among the ruling military class. Now...Now I have no clue what that lil bastard is up to.

He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

It's like..He's playing poker and going all-in with a handful of junk cards and we've seen them and he's still insisting that he's got a Royal Straight Full House Flush.

Yeah, this has gone long past just saber rattling for negotiating, unless he thinks that as long as he keeps upping the ante that eventually the UN restrictions will be eased. That isn't going to happen. What's more, he's Western educated in Switzerland, he knows that he's totally outmatched.

None of this makes sense.

That's what makes me wonder if Un is really calling the shots.I think the salad bowl hats are really in charge, and they really believe it's still 1953.

GAT_00:CaptSacto: That's what makes me wonder if Un is really calling the shots.

I saw some article speculating this is all trying to stop a coup from happening, but I don't understand how this would stop a coup either.

Right now, Kim is not personally responsible for any of the atrocities and human rights violations going on in Best Korea (in that he didn't order them, he's just perpetuating them). His generals and advisors, however, are. If Kim wants to make things better and normalize relations with the West, everyone else gets to stand in front of the Hague, and they know it--so if Kim HAS been making such noises, the generals have likewise been making noises to the effect of "Nice lifestyle you got here, 'Dear Leader', shame if anything happened to it."

OTOH, if Kim starts a war he knows he has to lose, he can surrender to the US on his own terms, which would include throwing his loyal generals under an Abrams tank (literally or figuratively, doesn't much matter) while he keeps his pudgy head intact. It's a win-win for him at this point.

This is like recess with the special-needs kid in his wheelchair ramming the sports jock in the ankles.If the jock punches Timmy in the face he's deemed a bully. If he does nothing Timmy will pinch his nuts with his reaching stick.

Infernalist:NK depends on China for basic survival. They feed them a supply of food and energy to keep the country afloat. They do so for a reason and it's not altruism.

No, that's not why. They feed them a supply of food and energy because otherwise, they would have millions of dirt poor, uneducated, half-starved, brainwashed zombies pouring in to mainland china. They already have a major demographics time-bomb, and adding the NK's in to the mix would probably destroy the country. It gives them the best of both worlds: they get a workforce that's cheaper than theirs (even if the level of production they can achieve is crude), and at the same time avert a potentially regime-shaking mob. NK is a bigger problem for China than it has EVER been for the United States.

Infernalist:You see, America has no worries about a formidable enemy sitting on its borders. It has two oceans and two proxy nations to secure itself against invasion. China is larger than the U.S. and 'has' no such protection other than their sea between themselves and Japan and 'that' body of water clearly is no barrier to invasion.

That's the point: this is outdated thinking. It doesn't make ANY strategic sense whatsoever. First of all, any first-world nation can deploy a sizable force to any point in the world in less than a week (not counting prep time). Second of all, China has a MASSIVE open-ocean border. NK does not represent any kind of relevant buffer or obstacle to an invasion fleet. None, whatsoever. It keeps US troops in SK from advancing by land into mainland China, but that would never have been a remotely intelligent military operation either. Not in the last 50 years, anyway. Any attack on China would be made with air and sea power, at least initially, and once that's done, why bother marching for days through NK instead of taking water and air transport? It's a silly, outmoded, entirely unrelaistic viewpoint that completely and utterly ignores how wars have been fought in the last couple of decades. Hell, we didn't invade Iraq by land. Sure, we brought in land troops eventually, but the initial assault was air. Once you have air and naval defenses down, why march when you can float way faster? And finally, I very much doubt that China is in any way, shape, or form worried about an attack from the US or it's allies. At least not at the official level. No one, not one single person in the world, thinks that we will see a legitimate war between the US and China. And IF we did, it would not be fought with conventional weapons.

NK's whole reason for existence disappeared sometime in the 70's as commercial and military flight was perfected, and Desert Storm 2 was the nail in the coffin.

Also, there is no way in hell China actually thinks of the US as their "enemies". And if you think of China as YOUR "enemy", you have to be absolutely deluded. The US and China are wrapped up so tight, President Obama could shiat in Mao's mummified mouth, and the worst they'd do is send us a stern letter, or possibly sink a fishing boat in international waters. The same holds true in reverse. Hell, we don't have the political will to commit to a real invasion of Iraq, and you think that anyone (least of all the people at the top of the food chain) are going to let the US get involved with a war against China? Ever?

Giltric:If I was China I would use NK to start an engagement with the US and then decimate the US in an all or nothing war.

That's silly, because that war would end with the world an unusable, burnt cinder, and all civilization reduced to grunting and painting on cave walls with chalk. Also, China has no interest in attacking the US. We are far too important to them, economically. Remember, they need us a WHOLE lot more than we need them.

What China SHOULD do is invade North Korea. This might sound crazy, but is actually a perfect solution to all of the major problems China is facing right now:

1) Overpopulation of young adult males. If instead of using their higher-tech arsenal, they instead start a draft, targeting undesirables - males 18-30 with no education, a poor or non-existent job, and a potential for getting restless at home - and then send the drafted men on foot into NK with barely enough equipment to have fought the first Korean War and no training, they could get rid of a ton of their unwanted young males. Which leads to...

2) Korean Humanitarian Crisis. If they send those poorly armed, angry, violent young men with no futures into North Korea, they could effectively get them to slaughter a large percentage of the native population. Especially since most of the native population is technically in the reserve, anyway. China is good enough at locking down on critics, foreign and domestic, and powerfule enough, that they could get away with this without suffering any serious backlash from the international community. After all, who's going to impose sanctions on China today? And since they have a permanent veto at the UN, they are essentially above any kind of real reproach or punishment. Wiping out most of the NK citizens eliminates the threat of "the worlds biggest humanitarian crisis", as so many people like to call it. This, in turn, opens the door to...

3) Mineral wealth. China has a decent supply of mineral wealth already, but most experts agree that NK has HUGE reserves of rare earth metals. The same rare-earth metals that make most of modern technology possible. These deposits are worth trillions, and would be a huge boon to China's wealth. It would also act as a safeguard against internal economic collapse. China's economy is actually incredibly fragile: they're essentially one really bad corruption scandal or a good look at their TRUE books away from economic colapse. Think 2007, and then multiply by 100. That bad. A huge pool of new mineral wealth would act as collateral against their currency, and ensure that they could weather any major shock to their banking system. It also buys them time to begin cleaning up their act, and stabilizing their currency - something they can't do now, since any move to strengthen the banking system and weed out the corruption might just send their existing economy tumbling off the edge. And speaking of which...

4) Eternal expansion. China's current economy revolves around perpetual expansion funded largely by the government and government-run banks. But most of this expansion lately has been of the "We need to do something, anything, just to look busy" variety. This is what's driving the creation of the massive ghost cities. Or the world's largest mall that sits almost completely unoccupied. Or any number of other ridiculous projects that churn the money around enough that it looks like the economy is growing, even if it isn't. A large, newly-claimed cache of mineral deposits would serve as a focal point of expansion, and allow the government to keep this artificial expansion going by heavily financing NK reconstruction and development. This will give their economy enough steam to push forward even while the central planning committee works on a sustainable and stable solution.

Really, this is a no-lose for China. To top it all off, it would establish them as a true super-power, acting as a unilateral interventionist force to patrol their region of the world. It would also simultaneously strengthen relations with the US (most of us are idiots, and love people flexing their muscles to beat down a "bully", even if said bully weighs 85lbs and has been coaxed into it by the star quarterback, who then proceeds to clobber him guilt-free), and will diminish US power in Asia, sending a strong message to unaligned countries and our less loyal allies that there's a new sheriff in town. If they can wait until NK makes the first move, so much the better, since then they also look like heroes on the world stage.

In fact, I'm a little bit shocked that China hasn't already done that. They really need to pay me a lot of money to go over and consult.

But, you're spot on about China's economics and the wealth laying in NK territory. The only problem is 'getting to it' will take a lot of initial investment. A decade or more and untold millions, if not billions to modernize NK's mining operations to the point of being able to get at their RRE wealth.

China 'could' do it, but it's a massive long-term investment in a country that isn't their's AND they have cultural issues regarding the Korean people in general.

There are five nations on this planet that are culturally capable of serious long-term planning. They are, in no particular order, Japan, Japan, Japan, China, and Japan.

As you say, China might not have the economic stability to invest in that kind of plan. And the point you make about their view of the Korean people is definitely a factor. But if they have the money, they would DEFINITELY have the will to pull it off.

Meanwhile, our corporations' idea of a long-term plan is whatever makes the most money over the next, gosh, eight whole months!

Peki:Dude, my brother is on one of those. STFU unless it's your butt on that ship.

/not interested in having him come home in a body bag

A a current DoD civilian, and former (retired) active duty, and with several friends in the region...I do kind of have a clue as to what that actually means.

Little Un could probably, maybe make a mess of the northern stretch of South Korea with their artillery. Which would be very, very bad. If and only if they get the first shot.Beyond that...not so much.

/not interested in anyone coming home in a bag.//us, the ROKs, or the NORKS

The DOD can use this to justify higher budget demands.The DHS will use this to justify tighter controls in our country.The greatest threat to the American population is not outside our borders, but within.

Igor Jakovsky:What has China had to say about all this, aside from supporting the UN resolutions? A guy (country) on your border threatens to nuke your largest trading partner. C'mon China.

Why do you think China hasn't said a SINGLE word about us flying B2s, F-22s by their doorsteps? or the US Navy hauling a giantass Egg (X-band search and targeting radar) and putting it in their backyard pool?

Sometimes the silence speaks louder than shouting or muscle flexing. If you don't think Obama has been talking to Xi on the secured line I got tons of steak and potatoes in Pyongyang to sell you.

This is China's place...they need to intervene and just take over in NK. If they really want to be a world power, this is the price they have to pay...you keep order in your own backyard...

Quite frankly, I think China is the one turning the key in Un's back. Their leaders must be ROFLing about all this. Look at it from their perspective... Duhmerica will step in and eliminate the NK leadership structure, destabilise the country for 10 years - who cares? In the meantime, they'll get to closely study the latest in American Nuke defense and stealth technology, right on their own doorstep. In terms of testing their equipment, it couldn't get any better... and I think you can safely trust that plenty of current Chinese equipment will be tested from within NK's borders.

KJU is very young. He has lived a very sheltered and priviledged live. He is basically clueless to the world let alone the typical north korean peasant. His dad is gone, his mom is gone, he hates his brothers and the welfare of his countrymen is obviously non existent. His marriage was arranged for political convenience and show and probably not a lot of love there either.That makes him dangerous and unpredictable.If he sees his rule and death as imminent, he wouldn't blink an eye to take down millions with him. His fellow countrymen let alone South Korean means ziltch.

Next week we're going to hear that North Korean TV is reporting that they 'won' the tense standoff and the west has made significant concessions to Dear Leader at which time he'll double rations from 4 grains of rice per day to 8, and he'll be wildly popular in his country.

GAT_00:Infernalist: I used to think that he was doing this strictly to shore up support among the ruling military class. Now...Now I have no clue what that lil bastard is up to.

He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

It's like..He's playing poker and going all-in with a handful of junk cards and we've seen them and he's still insisting that he's got a Royal Straight Full House Flush.

Yeah, this has gone long past just saber rattling for negotiating, unless he thinks that as long as he keeps upping the ante that eventually the UN restrictions will be eased. That isn't going to happen. What's more, he's Western educated in Switzerland, he knows that he's totally outmatched.

None of this makes sense.

And that's the part that scares me. Unpredictable nations with nuclear arms are frightening. Not quite 'PANIC' time yet, but...If I were the U.S. security apparatus, I'd be watching anything and everything coming out of NK right about now.

Fubini:North Korea detonates a nuke inside THEIR OWN BORDERS to create a pretense for going to war. NK blames South Korea, China backs them up and they use the confusion to delay a world/UN response. NK troops surge over the border with secret Chinese sleeper squads inside SK and take Seoul overnight.

A) China isn't stupid enough to fall for that.B) North Korean troops aren't nearly as well trained as they were in 1950 and have no combat experience.C) South Korean troops are far more competent than they were in 1950.D) The US has had 60 years to prepare for such an eventuality.

Amos Quito:One three decent high-altitude EMP's over the US - East, West, Center, and we're farked.

Ummm....no. Not even close. During the cold war, the Russians detonated high-yield, 300kT above a small city in Kazakstan, specifically to check for EMP damage. This was a very specific, very controlled blast, organized by top Russian scientists, using state-of-the-art technology for the time. The EMP shockwave absolutely crippled the city over which the blast took place, the furthest extent of "real" damage was about 600km, or 400 miles. So if the North Koreans managed to explode a 300kT nuke over, say, San Francisco, they would take out the bay area, and maybe do some sporadic damage to Portland. That's it. LA would be unaffected, as would Seattle. Which is assuming they had a 300kT nuke. Their last test is estimated to have been in the 7-10kT range. Going back to the history books, we see that the Russians first tried their EMP experiments with 1.2kT, 11kT, and 40kT yields, all of which yielded negligible results.

So no, an EMP is not even remotely a threat. It's more likely that Kim Jong Un walks across the Pacific, whips out his nuclear schlong, and rapes the West Coast to death.

Even Starfish Prime caused minimal damage past a 600 or so mile radius (since I doubt a temporary power fluctuation and a couple of blown street lights will bring the West Coast to its knees), and that was a 1.4mT blast.

doglover:If he said the car wasn't supposed to have tread, I believe him because he's raced one.

These are bridgestone's Formula 1 racing tires. Only one of them is completely treadless (the racing slick), and is mainly used in perfect conditions on a pristine track. Adam Corolla is not a racing expert. He's a celebrity who catches a track day here and there.

But really, if Adam Corolla got bent out of shape by that comment majorly, I seriously doubt that he is quite the expert that he is portrayed as by the media. He has an impressive car collection, but at his level of wealth, who doesn't? The only legit Automobile-related accomplishment I could find for him was winning the 2012 Toyota Pro/Celebrity race in the Celebrity category. It's not bad, but hardly makes him an expert on the finer points of rubber meeting road. Especially since he's never had to dive balls-deep into the physics of tire maintenance or performance the way someone trying to catch track days on a shoe-string budget does.

But this is neither here nor there. I get a little testy when it comes to cars.

China has lost control of the situation. If it wasn't obvious yesterday, it's obvious today. It's unclear whether China was ever in control, or they were just being played by K1 and K2. China at some point will reflect on what went wrong there.

As a corollary, there aren't a lot of ways out left for K3. One way or another he's gone, unless he wins...which is unlikely. Like Saddam Hussein he's a mad dog, and nobody will want him around anymore.

MrHappyRotter:Good bye, Golden Age of the United States. Very soon, our lives will be changing forever in ways we can't even begin to comprehend. The wrath of North Korea will never, never be forgotten. Sure, some of us will survive and adapt to a world that would be unrecognizable to us, but it will be just that, survival. I only hope I'm one of the lucky ones that dies in the immediate aftermath and not one of the ones who will suffer under North Korean supremacy. I for one will be spending my last remaining hours of this life making the best of what's left. The cats and I live like we've never lived before. I'll probably even stop reading Fark for a few minutes and stick my head outside long enough to enjoy the fresh, crisp cool air. And then, I'll cry myself to sleep.

Some Best Korean nerd is skimming this thread and is going to use that verbatim in the next KCNA news broadcast as evidence of our growing despair.

Infernalist:China 'could' do it, but it's a massive long-term investment in a country that isn't their's AND they have cultural issues regarding the Korean people in general.

Hence the first two points. A massive land invasion from the north that inflicts heavy personnel damage on both countries, but costs China next to nothing. Wipe out their dissenting class and at the same time, wipe out most of the north koreans. Then they get to the RREs free and clear.

And actually, the fact that it would take a decade to dig up is actually a plus. That's ten years of legitimate artificial economic inflation, and is also the minimum amount of time that it would take for China to get their more conventional economic house in order.

somedude210:ha-ha-guy: All out war is not ideal, but really as history has shown to get of an entrenched military dictatorship you at least need to strong encourage them to exit stage left. You can buy off some of them, but you at least need the threat of a bombing campaign to really have them move. Depending on how crazy they really are, one or two might need to get a visit from Mr. JDAM to convince the others to leave.

I honestly think that if Kim was allowed to rule without the Generals around, he could actually reform the country and open relations with the outside world. But for that to happen, we need to oust the Generals

Think Emperor Hirohito post-war japan. Something like that. Keep Kim as ruler but make NK neutered militarily and open trade relations with it. Do so as a joint US/China effort and we could quell most tensions in East Asia for 15-20 years.

China has no desire to see NK friendly with the U.S. NK is their buffer zone and a proxy to rile the Americans when they see fit.

Make no mistake about it, the Chinese are pissed off at Un right now, but only because he's not following orders.

ha-ha-guy:All out war is not ideal, but really as history has shown to get of an entrenched military dictatorship you at least need to strong encourage them to exit stage left. You can buy off some of them, but you at least need the threat of a bombing campaign to really have them move. Depending on how crazy they really are, one or two might need to get a visit from Mr. JDAM to convince the others to leave.

I honestly think that if Kim was allowed to rule without the Generals around, he could actually reform the country and open relations with the outside world. But for that to happen, we need to oust the Generals

Think Emperor Hirohito post-war japan. Something like that. Keep Kim as ruler but make NK neutered militarily and open trade relations with it. Do so as a joint US/China effort and we could quell most tensions in East Asia for 15-20 years.

utah dude:doglover: Sputnik was also something that's never been done before. The North Korean one is something you can look up how to do properly online.

yah cause a country that doesn't have electricity has the internet?

Are you insane? North Korea has electricity, the internet, top shelf booze, cuban cigars, hot biatches, anything a bourgeois could desire. No one who's working on the missiles goes without. Their best scientists have what they want for sure.

On the other hand, the raw materials they have access to are limited and thus their rockets often suck because they're jury rigged.

Suppose Kim-Jong-Un wants to leave Best Korea and live in the Western world. He's basically been forced into a life that perhaps he never really wanted. How would he possibly be able to get out of that life? How about force the military to launch a bloodless coup that allows him and his perky wife to leave Korea and live a life of ease in China. All he'd have to do is act so recklessly that the military would decide that he is no longer stable.

Suppose Kim-Jong-Un wants to leave Best Korea and live in the Western world. He's basically been forced into a life that perhaps he never really wanted. How would he possibly be able to get out of that life? How about force the military to launch a bloodless coup that allows him and his perky wife to leave Korea and live a life of ease in China. All he'd have to do is act so recklessly that the military would decide that he is no longer stable.

one problem with this theory. The military is all as insane if not moreso than the KIm clan. They wouldn't push him out, they'd praise him for finally finishing the great war with the Lesser Korean oppressors.

Ivo Shandor:Lost Thought 00: In the most technical sense of that term. It had a lower orbit than Sputnik

The North Korean satellite's current orbit is about 100 km above the International Space Station. Sputnik did have a higher apogee but its orbit was elliptical with a perigee of only 215 km (according to Wikipedia). Sputnik re-entered the atmosphere after 3 months and the Korean satellite is coming up on 4.

Sputnik was also something that's never been done before. The North Korean one is something you can look up how to do properly online.

silly Americans. NK is not starting a war to win. They want to lose! fight Americans, lose and you get American money to rebuild your country. Win, you get nothing. look at Vietnam. They won and what did they get? 3 decades of misery until China become a threat to US. nope, much safer to lose to US.

enemy of the state:GAT_00: SnakeLee: "Never has the whole Korean peninsula been exposed to such danger of a nuclear war as today," it added.

[c481901.r1.cf2.rackcdn.com image 364x370]

You sure about that?

Eisenhower openly considered ending the Korean war with nukes. He thought it was a cheap way to wage war.

I think you're thinking of MacArthur. None of the biographies of Ike that I've read claim that he considered at all.

It is true that the military in the US at that time viewed nukes as a very good bang for the buck bargain without much thought about what a nuclear war would really mean...

It was easier to be casual about nuclear war when we had an overwhelming superiority in capability. At the time MacArthur was removed the Soviets had maybe a half-dozen deployable warheads; we had somewhere in the neighborhood of 400.

I do have to wonder where they are going with all this bellicose rhetoric. They obviously can't follow up on any of this, and there are no mass troop movements reported, so nothing major is going to happen. It all appears to be for internal consumption, but to what end? I think it is to distract from their upcoming famine, but how long can they keep it up? Could be a run up to a small border skirmish after which they can declare victory, but that could get out of control easily for several reasons. If this is somehow positioning for the usual "return to the table, get food, keep building bombs, that isn't going to work this time, they have crossed the line with their threat, well, actually just saying that they are going to use nuclear weapons.

Wizard Drongo:This is China's place...they need to intervene and just take over in NK. If they really want to be a world power, this is the price they have to pay...you keep order in your own backyard...

You think China wants 25 million starving, brainwashed, Koreans who are probably lucky to have seen a cell phone in their lives to care for, when China and the US are still heavily economically interdependent, and China's staring down the barrel of a major economic bust of their own?

If it's game on, conflict between the US and China will probably end up being over Chinese treatment of Korean refugees, which'll in all likelihood err on the "ethnic cleansing" side of "crappy". China doesn't want this stunted, twenty-something moron in their backyard starting crap with the West, not as long as it's a powder keg in the form of a major humanitarian crisis waiting to happen, and as long as chilled diplomatic and economic relations would be their own death warrant. If you can say one thing about the Chinese government, it's that it's pragmatic to the extreme, and intervening in favor of North Korea in a potential conflict at this point is about the furthest from.

Guntram Shatterhand:I'm curious how China is going to react to this. NK is probably making their lives very difficult right now, it's either shiat or get off the pot. Keeping America pissed at this sad dictatorship can't be good for business.

I don't see Kim Jong-Un lasting long, no matter what occurs.

One thing we can be pretty sure of is that China doesn't want another US ally on its border. If I were Xi I'd be thinking of a pre-emptive occupation of the north (and deposition of the Kims).

Infernalist:He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

You forget that if Pyongyang launches a rocket that leaves eyesight, NK will tell everyone in NK that New York is now a smoking crater in the ground. They can't really be humiliated in this front because they have no international standing amongst the aware and alert. The biggest nuke NK can field could not destroy New York City with a direct hit.

I'm curious how China is going to react to this. NK is probably making their lives very difficult right now, it's either shiat or get off the pot. Keeping America pissed at this sad dictatorship can't be good for business.

iheartscotch:Exactly, mein Fürher; excuse me, Dear Leader. It is not only possible, it is essential. That is the whole idea of this machine, you know. Deterrence is the art of producing in the mind of the enemy... the fear to attack. And so, because of the automated and irrevocable decision making process which rules out human meddling, the doomsday machine is terrifying. It's simple to understand. And completely credible, and convincing

North Korea approves a nuclear strike on America? Isn't North Korea a dictatorship run by Lil'un? How does a dictatorship need permission and who did he get permission from? Are they saying that yesterday if he wanted to launch nukes, he would've been denied, but today it's a-okay?

I give myself permission to take a shiat. Now that I decided that I have permission, if I choose to do so, I may. Whereas 30secs ago if I had wanted to I would've needed to go through the extra step of giving myself permission. Unless this is like saying, "I"m going to take a shiat RIGHT NOW." Then that is more of a warning and a threat and everyone should be scared, especially those people in the car with me.

I think at this point the only thing stopping North Korea from being a large flat sheet of volcanic glass is the worry that China might step in.

NK has nukes. It is threatening to use them (allbeit we all know they'd be hard pressed to launch them 5 feet!) agains the west (The US, South Korea, Japan - so I'm fine!)....all we need is some divvy private taking a potshot to give the US casus beli and it's GO TIME.

But, as I said, the Chinese would likely intervene, now you've got two nuclear states (who can launch at each other) looking down the barrel of their ICBM's...

This is China's place...they need to intervene and just take over in NK. If they really want to be a world power, this is the price they have to pay...you keep order in your own backyard...

Gyrfalcon:OTOH, if Kim starts a war he knows he has to lose, he can surrender to the US on his own terms, which would include throwing his loyal generals under an Abrams tank (literally or figuratively, doesn't much matter) while he keeps his pudgy head intact. It's a win-win for him at this point.

Not really, because once an actual shooting war starts he'd be either totally sequestered from command and put in a locked room somewhere, or murdered.

dameron:My fear is that he'll float a nuke into the port of Long Beach. I have no doubt they could do this. This is exactly the scenario Oppenheimer presented to Congress back in 1945.

<i>Sen. Millikin: We... have mine-detecting devices, which are rather effective... I was wondering if anything of that kind might be available to use as a defense against that particular type of use of atomic bombs.

Dr. Oppenheimer: If you hired me to walk through the cellars of Washington to see whether there were atomic bombs, I think my most important tool would be a screwdriver to open the crates and look. I think that just walking by, swinging a little gadget would not give me the information </i>

It'd be REALLY hard to find a well hidden atomic bomb. Even given 1940's technology, the radioactive plutonium core of an implosion type bomb would weight less than 20 pounds.

This is an extremely important point that nearly everyone overlooks. Best Korea doesn't need missiles to deliver a nuke to take out a US city.

It would be very easy to conceal a nuke in a shipping cargo container and set it off when it gets into SF Bay. Send it part by part to Pakistan as innocent looking bits and pieces (baseball sized chuck of plutonium goes in a tractor engine block), assemble it, put it in a lead box; and into a container headed to the US. You wouldn't even have to bribe people to look the other way. Shielding a nuke so that radiation detectors can't find it is completely trivial, six inches of lead will do the job just fine.

Pakistan got alot of their nuke parts from NK (or was it the other way around?) so, it can be done.

Or, put it on a submarine and send it on a one way trip. You don't have to go all the way to California, Tokyo, US bases in South Korea, or Pearl Harbor are all alot closer.

Probably NK is just running at the mouth, but since they *can* deliver a nuke already, I think this needs to be taken seriously. I'd suggest a nuclear air burst to take out the electronics of the entire country, and then conventionally bomb every military-related installation into complete dust. It's a bad scenario, but I see no particular reason to think that NK is batshiat insane and means business this time.

Infernalist:I used to think that he was doing this strictly to shore up support among the ruling military class. Now...Now I have no clue what that lil bastard is up to.

He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

It's like..He's playing poker and going all-in with a handful of junk cards and we've seen them and he's still insisting that he's got a Royal Straight Full House Flush.

Yeah, this has gone long past just saber rattling for negotiating, unless he thinks that as long as he keeps upping the ante that eventually the UN restrictions will be eased. That isn't going to happen. What's more, he's Western educated in Switzerland, he knows that he's totally outmatched.

awalkingecho:Additionally I thought it interesting that the on February 12th, NK conducted its nuke test, and the following day just before the State of the Union address, Russia's bombers were found circling Guam. I wonder if there's some people waiting for an opportunistic distraction.

Not to mention other recent incidents near Alaska and in the Gulf of Mexico from Pootie-poot.

What people don't realize is that Russia is friendly with NK, they buy minerals and labor camps from them. VICE has a documentary about it.

Suppose Kim-Jong-Un wants to leave Best Korea and live in the Western world. He's basically been forced into a life that perhaps he never really wanted. How would he possibly be able to get out of that life? How about force the military to launch a bloodless coup that allows him and his perky wife to leave Korea and live a life of ease in China. All he'd have to do is act so recklessly that the military would decide that he is no longer stable.

I have a very similar crackpot theory, he wants to be "bought out" of NK leadership.

Sure he's a God-Emperor, but of a failing shiat-hole who can barely keep "The People's Palace's" electricity on. He was raised in Switzerland and has seen what the luxuries enjoyed by almost everyone in the west.

Quite frankly the the only thing stopping him is the general's and money, he basically has the whole country working for his comfort. It's how Daddy Kim became the biggest consumer of Hennessy Cognac.

If NK has Swiss bank accounts it's possible he could dissolve the state and take over those accounts for himself and buy off the elite guard so he and his perky wife don't die. Then head over to Switzerland and live off the money forever.

Let China, SK, and the US handle the reconstruction of that craphole.

Granted how would the UN and world react if he asked for a couple million (or to keep the rights to the Kaesong complex or NK mineral rights) for him to leave?

my crackpot theory is he wants to "kill off" a large portion of the population and then "declare a cease fire!" and now he can feed his people without outside help.. then he can stay in power for the rest of his long life and tell the rest of the world to leave them alone..

GAT_00:Infernalist: I used to think that he was doing this strictly to shore up support among the ruling military class. Now...Now I have no clue what that lil bastard is up to.

He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

It's like..He's playing poker and going all-in with a handful of junk cards and we've seen them and he's still insisting that he's got a Royal Straight Full House Flush.

Yeah, this has gone long past just saber rattling for negotiating, unless he thinks that as long as he keeps upping the ante that eventually the UN restrictions will be eased. That isn't going to happen. What's more, he's Western educated in Switzerland, he knows that he's totally outmatched.

None of this makes sense.

He seriously has no other options, there's no food, they are facing a famine worse than the one in the 90's which killed at least 10% of their people.

The past 2 decades they'd rattle the saber and the UN would show up with food to shut them up. Now the UN is sick of their shiat and wants them to rot. What the hell else are they going to do?

My crackpot theory is that he's trying to get "bought out" of NK leadership and go live in Switzerland for the rest of his life. There is no way they can modernize that shiathole by themselves.

doglover:StopLurkListen: doglover: cameroncrazy1984: SuperNinjaToad: no worries... I think the flash point of WWIII will be the mideast not northeast Asia. Highly unlikely. Despots, tyrants and crazies come and go BUT religions stay forever!

I guess if there is a silver lining in all this is there is no 'religious/tribal' variable in the equation and that is HUGE.

China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Japan went to war because they believed their Emperor was an infallible man-god.

Actually they went to war because they were trying to build an empire based on the models of the European powers and they carved out a nice little section of China and the South Pacific as theirs. If it weren't for those pesky Germans doing the same thing in Europe, they might have gotten away with it.

In the hypothetical alternative history where Germany wasn't a concern, Japan and the U.S. were almost guaranteed to go to war with each other*, and without an America fighting a two front war and being able to concentrate exclusively on fighting Japan, I would assume that this hypothetical scenario wouldn't end in any better a result for Japan.

*At the time, the U.S. imposed an embargo on oil exports to Japan, and they were in desperate need for oil. Which encouraged them to take the oil-rich areas of southeast Asia by force.

And why did start the oil embargo? Because they disrupted trade with China, who was busy buying up war supplies from us.

If there was no European front, what would that war have looked like? Would ze Germans have helped out? The Italians? Would Stalin join in the fray against Japan or start annexing other lands as well?

Imagine that: Nazis vs Commies at Midway.

Everybody always forgets this, but Mussolini was the grand-daddy of fascism in Europe. He took power while Hitler was still rotting in jail. Plus, he came up with the "spazio vitale" (of which lebensraum is a ripoff) back in 1919, basically laying claim to a "New Roman Empire" in the eastern Med. Most people are aware that Germany knocked off part of Austria, but war wasn't declared until Hitler invaded Poland. Italy, meanwhile, had been conquering various eastern Med islands, as well as the eastern coast of the Adriatic since the 20s. They'd also been adventuring in northern Africa, tightening their hold in Libya and attacking Ethiopia. They were at loggerheads with the French over a lot of this, since France had its own north African colonies and Mediterranean islands. Mussolini was leading up to a European war, but he wanted Germany to hold off until he could split French and English interests further. Hitler jumped the gun, and Mussolini decided to back him after seeing the results of the blitzkrieg.

But take Hitler out of the equation, and you still end up with Italy clashing with France over the Med and north Africa. That'll end up as war someway or another, although possibly not with U.K. involvement.

awalkingecho:baufan2005: The funny thing is that after Kim Jung Ill died everyone said that his son was the sane one. I really do think he believes all the propaganda that his father showed him his whole life.

He went to school in the West. He knows that propaganda is horseshiat.

Since im sure Un is about one of the very very few people in NK who is allowed to surf the web uncensored he has to know or his intelligence knows that we have been mocking him endlessly since he started this crap..well we have been mocking him and his dad for quite some time now. But we have turned it up to 10 now.Its the American way!Its got to drive them nuts that we are laughing at them when they are trying to intimidate and provoke the US.

geek_mars:GoSurfing: Thought here, but: Let's say NK does lob a nuke at the US or South Korea. Let's say it falls short, doesn't reach the destination, plummets into the ocean, or there are extremely minimal casualties.

Wouldn't it be in our best interest not to retaliate with nuclear means?

Regardless of what NK does with regards to nukes (U.S. or allies, success of failure) it's in our best interests not to retaliate with nuclear means. Depending on where we would drop a nuke, the fallout could affect SK or China, neither of which we would want to happen. Aside from their artillery locations, the only political target of consequence is Pyongyang, which we wouldn't want utterly destroyed and uninhabitable.The best scenario I can think of would involve U.S. military might putting the smack down on NK. The peninsula being united under the current SK government. China financing the reconstruction with the understanding that they get a ROI from the rare earth metals once their they're extractable.I really hope that Un hasn't trapped himself with all his fiery rhetoric. War would be terrible. Nuclear war would be devastating to the entire region. A coup could wind up putting someone even worse in charge. Sadly, no matter what happens, it's the citizens of NK who will (continue to) suffer the most. And that's the real tragedy, since none of this is their fault.

GoSurfing:Thought here, but: Let's say NK does lob a nuke at the US or South Korea. Let's say it falls short, doesn't reach the destination, plummets into the ocean, or there are extremely minimal casualties.

Wouldn't it be in our best interest not to retaliate with nuclear means?

Regardless of what NK does with regards to nukes (U.S. or allies, success of failure) it's in our best interests not to retaliate with nuclear means. Depending on where we would drop a nuke, the fallout could affect SK or China, neither of which we would want to happen. Aside from their artillery locations, the only political target of consequence is Pyongyang, which we wouldn't want utterly destroyed and uninhabitable.The best scenario I can think of would involve U.S. military might putting the smack down on NK. The peninsula being united under the current SK government. China financing the reconstruction with the understanding that they get a ROI from the rare earth metals once their extractable.I really hope that Un hasn't trapped himself with all his fiery rhetoric. War would be terrible. Nuclear war would be devastating to the entire region. A coup could wind up putting someone even worse in charge. Sadly, no matter what happens, it's the citizens of NK who will (continue to) suffer the most. And that's the real tragedy, since none of this is their fault.

Additionally I thought it interesting that the on February 12th, NK conducted its nuke test, and the following day just before the State of the Union address, Russia's bombers were found circling Guam. I wonder if there's some people waiting for an opportunistic distraction.

Not to mention other recent incidents near Alaska and in the Gulf of Mexico from Pootie-poot.

Gawdzila:Do you think? I don't know that he does.Even if someone attempts to grab the reigns from him, I don't think he'll start shooting just for the hell of it. He's egotistical, not clinically insane.IMO, he'd take his chances trying to win a power struggle rather than invite certain death by lobbing rockets at the U.S. or Korea.

Well, I use the term 'dies' a bit loosely here. More like, his nation does. I don't mean necessarily there will be a coup, though there probably would be. Ideally, China just throws him some biscuits for his people and tells him to stop barking at the neighbors.

awalkingecho:Gawdzila: The thing is, Un has kind of blustered himself into a corner. If it really is the case that he doesn't have solid support from within, one wonders might happen if he runs out of threats to make and it comes to put-up-or-shut-up time. Or, more remotely, if his failure to follow through on his threatening leads to some sort of internal coup or power struggle.

I expect the rhetoric to eventually calm down and things to return to normal after Un declares victory within his own country, but there is some remote chance that this might get... weird.

This is the whole point. He's out of options. And his military hardlining and mobilization has cost him the preparation for the next harvest. There will be no food, and there will be no aid. He dies if he 'declares victory' anyway. He might as well take some people out with him.

Do you think? I don't know that he does.Even if someone attempts to grab the reigns from him, I don't think he'll start shooting just for the hell of it. He's egotistical, not clinically insane.IMO, he'd take his chances trying to win a power struggle rather than invite certain death by lobbing rockets at the U.S. or Korea.

awalkingecho:Gawdzila: The thing is, Un has kind of blustered himself into a corner. If it really is the case that he doesn't have solid support from within, one wonders might happen if he runs out of threats to make and it comes to put-up-or-shut-up time. Or, more remotely, if his failure to follow through on his threatening leads to some sort of internal coup or power struggle.

I expect the rhetoric to eventually calm down and things to return to normal after Un declares victory within his own country, but there is some remote chance that this might get... weird.

This is the whole point. He's out of options. And his military hardlining and mobilization has cost him the preparation for the next harvest. There will be no food, and there will be no aid. He dies if he 'declares victory' anyway. He might as well take some people out with him.

Gawdzila:The thing is, Un has kind of blustered himself into a corner. If it really is the case that he doesn't have solid support from within, one wonders might happen if he runs out of threats to make and it comes to put-up-or-shut-up time. Or, more remotely, if his failure to follow through on his threatening leads to some sort of internal coup or power struggle.

I expect the rhetoric to eventually calm down and things to return to normal after Un declares victory within his own country, but there is some remote chance that this might get... weird.

This is the whole point. He's out of options. And his military hardlining and mobilization has cost him the preparation for the next harvest. There will be no food, and there will be no aid. He dies if he 'declares victory' anyway. He might as well take some people out with him.

This is just a bunch of blustering because we aren't kowtowing to them.NK knows they'll be destroyed if they actually do anything, and they don't want to commit suicide.

I can think of two reasons Un might be doing this:One, he might be doing the traditional NK tactic of trying to start negotiations by tossing threats, and is simply escalating because Obama won't reward his tantrums.Two, he might be experiencing erosion in his authority within the regime, and is doing a lot of blustering to try and show those old guys that he is hardcore.

The thing is, Un has kind of blustered himself into a corner. If it really is the case that he doesn't have solid support from within, one wonders might happen if he runs out of threats to make and it comes to put-up-or-shut-up time. Or, more remotely, if his failure to follow through on his threatening leads to some sort of internal coup or power struggle.

I expect the rhetoric to eventually calm down and things to return to normal after Un declares victory within his own country, but there is some remote chance that this might get... weird.

I don't know - something is really fishy here. Meeting Dennis Rodman, then threatening a nuclear attack? Un is a basketball fan (from other sources, not just the Rodman thing). Why would attacking the US make any sense?

Maybe someone else is in charge, with Un being used as a figurehead. Or maybe this is a Wag the Dog situation constructed by American intelligence to justify attacking the North.

cameroncrazy1984:awalkingecho: cameroncrazy1984: SuperNinjaToad: no worries... I think the flash point of WWIII will be the mideast not northeast Asia. Highly unlikely. Despots, tyrants and crazies come and go BUT religions stay forever!

I guess if there is a silver lining in all this is there is no 'religious/tribal' variable in the equation and that is HUGE.

China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Japan went to war because they believed their Emperor was an infallible man-god.

Well, at least this time when we nuke Asians, it'll be a black dude pulling the trigger.

/OBL pretty much justified the use of any weapon based on what we did to Germany and Japan/those crazy terrorists forget (conveniently) that casualty rates on an invasion of Japan would have been astro-farking-nomical./One study stated 1.7 million Allied casualties including 600,000 or so dead with over 1 million Japanese dead.

SuperNinjaToad:China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Errr, not really. South Korea is about 25% Christian and about 25% Buddhist. You could say about 50% of the population isn't religious, and you could argue that South Korea is a SECULAR country in the sense that religion doesn't permeate their politics the way it does in a middle-Eastern country or even in the USA, but it's far from being an "atheistic-type society."

cameroncrazy1984:SuperNinjaToad: no worries... I think the flash point of WWIII will be the mideast not northeast Asia. Highly unlikely. Despots, tyrants and crazies come and go BUT religions stay forever!

I guess if there is a silver lining in all this is there is no 'religious/tribal' variable in the equation and that is HUGE.

China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Japan went to war because they believed their Emperor was an infallible man-god.

Actually they went to war because they were trying to build an empire based on the models of the European powers and they carved out a nice little section of China and the South Pacific as theirs. If it weren't for those pesky Germans doing the same thing in Europe, they might have gotten away with it.

awalkingecho:cameroncrazy1984: SuperNinjaToad: no worries... I think the flash point of WWIII will be the mideast not northeast Asia. Highly unlikely. Despots, tyrants and crazies come and go BUT religions stay forever!

I guess if there is a silver lining in all this is there is no 'religious/tribal' variable in the equation and that is HUGE.

China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Japan went to war because they believed their Emperor was an infallible man-god.

I think it is strange that we invaded Iraq because of the threat of "Yellow Cake", and nukes. This country threatens us directly and we are doing nothing. They have said the war is back on. Could we just go in and finish this? I wonder what plans are being made. We do have the right, because my dad fought on the Chosin and there never was a peace treaty.

GoSurfing:Also, assuming war with NK does break out, and assuming we defeat them unilaterally. What then? Who claims the land? Does South Korea get first dibs, or will China flood men across the border and attempt to seize the area? Or do we have to go in and occupy? There would be a power vaccuum. It isn't really the NK threat that scares me, it is more the aftermath. That is what I believe could cause WWIII.

Korean belongs to the Koreans. I'm having trouble envisioning a scenario in which China would even think they could get control of North Korea if it loses a war with South Korea.

Now, maybe, if China started a war with North Korea and South Korea wasn't involved, as some other person posted earlier in the thread. But it seems unlikely.

cameroncrazy1984:SuperNinjaToad: no worries... I think the flash point of WWIII will be the mideast not northeast Asia. Highly unlikely. Despots, tyrants and crazies come and go BUT religions stay forever!

I guess if there is a silver lining in all this is there is no 'religious/tribal' variable in the equation and that is HUGE.

China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Japan went to war because they believed their Emperor was an infallible man-god.

true BUT it didn't cause WW3 and it is usually contained within the country. If it's religious based than it extends beyond political borders and much easier to spread and almost impossible to fight. Imagine if say everything is equal except that NK, Russia and China are fundamental Muslims countries... and SK and Japan are 'Christian' countries. It would make things much much dicey than it is. That was my point.

cameroncrazy1984:SuperNinjaToad: no worries... I think the flash point of WWIII will be the mideast not northeast Asia. Highly unlikely. Despots, tyrants and crazies come and go BUT religions stay forever!

I guess if there is a silver lining in all this is there is no 'religious/tribal' variable in the equation and that is HUGE.

China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Japan went to war because they believed their Emperor was an infallible man-god.

cameroncrazy1984:SuperNinjaToad: no worries... I think the flash point of WWIII will be the mideast not northeast Asia. Highly unlikely. Despots, tyrants and crazies come and go BUT religions stay forever!

I guess if there is a silver lining in all this is there is no 'religious/tribal' variable in the equation and that is HUGE.

China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Japan went to war because they believed their Emperor was an infallible man-god.

SuperNinjaToad:no worries... I think the flash point of WWIII will be the mideast not northeast Asia. Highly unlikely. Despots, tyrants and crazies come and go BUT religions stay forever!

I guess if there is a silver lining in all this is there is no 'religious/tribal' variable in the equation and that is HUGE.

China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Japan went to war because they believed their Emperor was an infallible man-god.

no worries... I think the flash point of WWIII will be the mideast not northeast Asia. Highly unlikely. Despots, tyrants and crazies come and go BUT religions stay forever!

I guess if there is a silver lining in all this is there is no 'religious/tribal' variable in the equation and that is HUGE.

China, NK, SK, Japan etc are pretty much atheistic/agnostic type societies and no one is going to go to war because Buddha, MSM, Allah or Jesus told them to nor are they fighting infidels and die as myrtyrs and be rewarded in the afterlife.

Popular Opinion:the little dung beetle could also tell his people that he is retaliating for something (that he makes up).he might tell them that the US is responsible for stealing korean food and that is why they are starving.there is nobody there to call bullshiat (for long)

the nazi's raided and killed their own citizens in border towns (while disguised foreigners) and then showed film footage of victims before movies in the theaters to get germans worked up to support their own aggression.it's not like the germans could go online and find out the whole thing was faked.

But why bother? There's no reason for this. They have no say in what he does anyway and he's not subject to popular opinion.

lizardbrain:It's all just a ploy to get the West to offer them more aid if they comply.

After today I would tell them to go screw now and forever because any future assistance is no more. Nothing ever again.Then fly over dropping millions of pamphlets explaining to the 'citizens' why they are all doomed and who they have to thank for it. Perhaps then they'll fix life themselves.Comply or don't comply, it's over anyway so go pound sand.I'm certain he's full of shiat but no farking way would I give them anything anymore. He went past the point of no return.fark him.

the little dung beetle could also tell his people that he is retaliating for something (that he makes up).he might tell them that the US is responsible for stealing korean food and that is why they are starving.there is nobody there to call bullshiat (for long)

the nazi's raided and killed their own citizens in border towns (while disguised foreigners) and then showed film footage of victims before movies in the theaters to get germans worked up to support their own aggression.it's not like the germans could go online and find out the whole thing was faked.

scottydoesntknow:lizardbrain: It's all just a ploy to get the West to offer them more aid if they comply.

It's gone past that point now. He's puffed his chest too much and now the other nations are calling his hand. Whether he's bluffing or willing to go all in is now up to him/them. There won't be any aid unless they start dismantling everything that they've been threatening with.

My question is whether or not the common N. Korean knows what's going on. If they don't know how much shiat he's actually talking then I wouldn't be as worried, as he wouldn't look like a total fool and moron if he caved. I'd be pretty worried if they did know, because then he has little reason to not go all in.

the common north korean has the same access to media and news as the average afghan cooking his meal over a camel dung fire. none.if the common north korean knows anything at all, it is only what the state wants him to know or think.there are those that have some means of knowing more, or there wouldn't be dissidents.

Suppose Kim-Jong-Un wants to leave Best Korea and live in the Western world. He's basically been forced into a life that perhaps he never really wanted. How would he possibly be able to get out of that life? How about force the military to launch a bloodless coup that allows him and his perky wife to leave Korea and live a life of ease in China. All he'd have to do is act so recklessly that the military would decide that he is no longer stable.

one problem with this theory. The military is all as insane if not moreso than the KIm clan. They wouldn't push him out, they'd praise him for finally finishing the great war with the Lesser Korean oppressors.

I don't doubt that Kim is looking for an out somewhere though

I agree. Most people don't realized this 'kid' spent much of his most formative years living a lavish lifestyle in Europe and going to schools there. Suddenly his dad dies and he is thrust into a position of governing a shiathole country with millions of starving people looking at him like he is god and a military that is so brainwashed through decades of propaganda and also looking at him for direction.That dude wants out BUT he can't just hop on a plane and say see ya!He has to get an out where he can still live a quiet lavish lifestyle somewhere while preserving his family name and dynasty but look like some sort of a anti western hero in the eyes of the norks. I'm betting he is also living such a controlled and scripted life that making some sort of secret deal with spies etc is near impossible without being found out.

kipLinger:silly Americans. NK is not starting a war to win. They want to lose! fight Americans, lose and you get American money to rebuild your country. Win, you get nothing. look at Vietnam. They won and what did they get? 3 decades of misery until China become a threat to US. nope, much safer to lose to US.

lizardbrain:It's all just a ploy to get the West to offer them more aid if they comply.

It's gone past that point now. He's puffed his chest too much and now the other nations are calling his hand. Whether he's bluffing or willing to go all in is now up to him/them. There won't be any aid unless they start dismantling everything that they've been threatening with.

My question is whether or not the common N. Korean knows what's going on. If they don't know how much shiat he's actually talking then I wouldn't be as worried, as he wouldn't look like a total fool and moron if he caved. I'd be pretty worried if they did know, because then he has little reason to not go all in.

Lusiphur:That's the point: this is outdated thinking. It doesn't make ANY strategic sense whatsoever

I agree from a rational, strategic point of view, but most people don't think rationally or strategically. The sheer proximity is going to cause problems for some people. Imagine if Baja California suddenly became a Chinese colony. It would make some people leery, not for any good reason, but just because they were there. Throw in an overblown military presence, and I can see a lot of regular folk being very unhappy.

The militaries aren't the only ones calling the shots here, there are lots of politicians in the mix, and they can have profoundly non-rational motives.

Mr. Shabooboo:As someone who is listening for any interesting HF military traffic..I'm getting a kick out of thatreference...

Is it bad that your HF (High Frequency) reference was my second choice of acronym decryption? First choice was Harbor Freight ... go to war with the Norks for 20% off with a coupon, and get a free flashlight!

awalkingecho:scottydoesntknow: And they'll use footage from Fallout: New Vegas for it!

I think it would be better if they used footage of the destruction of Megaton in FO3. Makes US look like we were already as ramshackle and cobble-nailed as they are already indoctrinated to believe we are.

I like that. Then we send them a video of Liberty Prime wrecking their shiat. And we render it to actually be him in Pyongyang and Un running away like he's on a treadmill.

neongoats:MrHappyRotter: Good bye, Golden Age of the United States. Very soon, our lives will be changing forever in ways we can't even begin to comprehend. The wrath of North Korea will never, never be forgotten. Sure, some of us will survive and adapt to a world that would be unrecognizable to us, but it will be just that, survival. I only hope I'm one of the lucky ones that dies in the immediate aftermath and not one of the ones who will suffer under North Korean supremacy. I for one will be spending my last remaining hours of this life making the best of what's left. The cats and I live like we've never lived before. I'll probably even stop reading Fark for a few minutes and stick my head outside long enough to enjoy the fresh, crisp cool air. And then, I'll cry myself to sleep.

Some Best Korean nerd is skimming this thread and is going to use that verbatim in the next KCNA news broadcast as evidence of our growing despair.

It will have to be edited. I mentioned the cats but the North Koreans believe we don't have any food here.

neongoats:MrHappyRotter: Good bye, Golden Age of the United States. Very soon, our lives will be changing forever in ways we can't even begin to comprehend. The wrath of North Korea will never, never be forgotten. Sure, some of us will survive and adapt to a world that would be unrecognizable to us, but it will be just that, survival. I only hope I'm one of the lucky ones that dies in the immediate aftermath and not one of the ones who will suffer under North Korean supremacy. I for one will be spending my last remaining hours of this life making the best of what's left. The cats and I live like we've never lived before. I'll probably even stop reading Fark for a few minutes and stick my head outside long enough to enjoy the fresh, crisp cool air. And then, I'll cry myself to sleep.

Some Best Korean nerd is skimming this thread and is going to use that verbatim in the next KCNA news broadcast as evidence of our growing despair.

Good bye, Golden Age of the United States. Very soon, our lives will be changing forever in ways we can't even begin to comprehend. The wrath of North Korea will never, never be forgotten. Sure, some of us will survive and adapt to a world that would be unrecognizable to us, but it will be just that, survival. I only hope I'm one of the lucky ones that dies in the immediate aftermath and not one of the ones who will suffer under North Korean supremacy. I for one will be spending my last remaining hours of this life making the best of what's left. The cats and I live like we've never lived before. I'll probably even stop reading Fark for a few minutes and stick my head outside long enough to enjoy the fresh, crisp cool air. And then, I'll cry myself to sleep.

awalkingecho:Lusiphur: Infernalist: But, you also have to consider that they rather like having the NKs there as a buffer nation and a leashed dog to threaten the U.S. with. They're going to try and maintain that status quo if at all possible. They do NOT want to move into NK unless there's no other choice.

I keep hearing this canard, but it really doesn't make any sense. Why do they need a buffer zone? What is it a buffer against? More specifically, what does having a PHYSICAL buffer do in an age where you can travel around the world in less than 24 hours?

As far as having a lap-dog to threaten the US, what does that accomplish for them? What does China get by having a country that is known to not be a credible threat to, really, anyone (except an estimated 30k South Koreans) threaten the world's largest superpower? It's not like the global community makes concessions to China every time one of the Kims rattle their saber.

It's a useless entity, and the people going on and on about buffer zones and lap-dogs are living 50 years ago in a world where the Cold War is still on using Cold War technology. "Buffer Zone" is an anachronism, and doesn't really belong in the modern playbook.

Farking THIS. Bears repeating, because I'm tired of hearing it too.

You might not 'like' that these are terms still in use, and if you like, you can use 'other' terms to fit the situation if it makes you feel better, but the reality is this:

NK depends on China for basic survival. They feed them a supply of food and energy to keep the country afloat. They do so for a reason and it's not altruism. NK is a proxy, a loud angry dog that they use to rile the U.S. on occasion. Mostly for political reasons but sometimes just to get us angry.

Un is NOT playing by the rules of the game. He's not supposed to THIS FAR as it brings the American military into play and the Chinese do NOT like that.

As for the term 'buffer zone', it's the same reason why we're so irate about Cuba. It's the same reason why the Soviet Union developed the Iron Curtain and the buffer zone Eastern Europe countries. Now, you may not like that this tactic still exists, but it still DOES exist even if you don't care for it and call it outdated and obsolete. You see, America has no worries about a formidable enemy sitting on its borders. It has two oceans and two proxy nations to secure itself against invasion. China is larger than the U.S. and 'has' no such protection other than their sea between themselves and Japan and 'that' body of water clearly is no barrier to invasion.

So, yes, they treat NK as a buffer zone nation to create some breathing room between themselves and their enemies, even if you don't care for the terms used.

yagottabefarkinkiddinme:On 9/11 the DEFCON may have been at 3... But the doomsday plan had gone into effect. I remember the media saying that. Oh, wait. Here it is again.

BS DEFCON3, we were at doomsday.

Link

That...doesn't make sense. You can't jump from Defcon to something completely different. The Doomsday plan does not go into effect when Defcon reaches a certain level and Defcon reaching a certain level does not automatically trigger the plan.

Per the 9/11 Commission report, we only reached Defcon 3. They were on standby for 2, but the order never came.

doglover:But anyone who's taken high school physics will remember that race car tires are smooth for maximum friction. Once the smooth rubber starts to melt, the coefficient is higher than any possible tread pattern and so they just focus on maximizing surface area.

And anyone who knows anything about cars knows that all but the most purpose-built ultra-high-performance tires (like drag slicks, and some racing slicks) have treads. This is because treads, while technically diminishing the contact patch, serve many other important factors. Like controlling contact geometry. That is, when the tire is placed under stress (such as in high-speed cornering), the rubber deforms in a very specific and planned manner. Or evacuating water and debris, if there is a possibility of either, from underneath the tire.

In fact, most high performance tires have treads. The tire is significantly smoother than any standard tire, but will have several directionally-biased channels.

Or in other words, check your facts before correcting people! (says the slightly out of shape, NYC-living Jew with a race car).

Infernalist:This is a very valid point. And yet, if it's so logical as all that, why haven't the Chinese already moved in to modernize NK and simply lay claim to the vast majority of those RREs? They already buy most of NK's mineral exports BELOW COST of extraction..

Because if they simply tried to take over, South Korea would have a shiat fit, and that would drag the US into it, and we'd have WW3 on our hands. If, instead, they wait for a plausible excuse (like preemptive military action by NK), they get to take over AND look like heroes.

Or, possibly, because the Chinese are not nearly as diabolical and convoluted as I am. I should have been a bond villain. If only I had studied more in college.

Jim_Callahan:Yeah, NK is setting itself up to be nuked... by China. The US would just take out the launch sites or intercept the woefully under-tech missiles the NK warheads are on, we tend to feel bad about picking on retards these days.

China... not so reluctant to respond to someone trying to start a war on their northern border with actual, preemptive force.

Lusiphur:Infernalist: But, you also have to consider that they rather like having the NKs there as a buffer nation and a leashed dog to threaten the U.S. with. They're going to try and maintain that status quo if at all possible. They do NOT want to move into NK unless there's no other choice.

I keep hearing this canard, but it really doesn't make any sense. Why do they need a buffer zone? What is it a buffer against? More specifically, what does having a PHYSICAL buffer do in an age where you can travel around the world in less than 24 hours?

As far as having a lap-dog to threaten the US, what does that accomplish for them? What does China get by having a country that is known to not be a credible threat to, really, anyone (except an estimated 30k South Koreans) threaten the world's largest superpower? It's not like the global community makes concessions to China every time one of the Kims rattle their saber.

It's a useless entity, and the people going on and on about buffer zones and lap-dogs are living 50 years ago in a world where the Cold War is still on using Cold War technology. "Buffer Zone" is an anachronism, and doesn't really belong in the modern playbook.

Infernalist:But, you also have to consider that they rather like having the NKs there as a buffer nation and a leashed dog to threaten the U.S. with. They're going to try and maintain that status quo if at all possible. They do NOT want to move into NK unless there's no other choice.

I keep hearing this canard, but it really doesn't make any sense. Why do they need a buffer zone? What is it a buffer against? More specifically, what does having a PHYSICAL buffer do in an age where you can travel around the world in less than 24 hours?

As far as having a lap-dog to threaten the US, what does that accomplish for them? What does China get by having a country that is known to not be a credible threat to, really, anyone (except an estimated 30k South Koreans) threaten the world's largest superpower? It's not like the global community makes concessions to China every time one of the Kims rattle their saber.

It's a useless entity, and the people going on and on about buffer zones and lap-dogs are living 50 years ago in a world where the Cold War is still on using Cold War technology. "Buffer Zone" is an anachronism, and doesn't really belong in the modern playbook.

How close to Japan would you have to get to EMP them into the 19th Century?

Really close range. Like...Directly over a city. EMPs are powerful but very short-range.

Now, the Soviets intended on using high-altitude nukes in such number as to blanket the U.S. in an attempt to short out communications coast-to-coast, but their nukes were vastly superior in design and power and number than anything the NK government has access to at the moment.

Ivo Shandor:Lost Thought 00: In the most technical sense of that term. It had a lower orbit than Sputnik

The North Korean satellite's current orbit is about 100 km above the International Space Station. Sputnik did have a higher apogee but its orbit was elliptical with a perigee of only 215 km (according to Wikipedia). Sputnik re-entered the atmosphere after 3 months and the Korean satellite is coming up on 4.

I just landed a rover on Eve and got a Mk2 capsule to orbit the Mün once before being kicked out into a encounter with Minmus, so I got a kick out of that.

Xetal:Why would the US want to stop this? It gives us a perfect excuse to keep extending our military might into the pacific, including missile interceptor systems, airbases, and naval assets.

China is worried about being "boxed in and contained"... they should be! With friends like North Korea it gives the United States a free hand to do whatever we want in the region in the name of global security. You would think that China wouldn't be the most thrilled with North Korea over that.

Exactly! There's no reason at all for the Chinese to want this escalated. NK is supposed to make a lot of noise and then STOP short of actually making the Americans show up. They're not playing according to their script and the Chinese have got to be pissed off about it.

You very well may be correct and as I stated from the beginning of my initial post is I do not claim to be an expert on this subject. However, if one were to look at China's actions in the past decade, they have behaved like the prom queen knowing that a handjob is enough to make you forget about her blowing the captain of the football team.

How much longer will the US be useful to China? Yes we are the largest economy in the world, but China's efforts in emerging markets could more than offset the potential loss to our markets should the US try to play hard ball. Add to the mix China owns almost $2 Trillion in US debt and can tease the opportunity for US companies to have an opportunity to sell in the mainland and I could easily see how China could feel they were in a position of strength when dealing with the US re: North Korea.

While I could be wrong, there are only two certainties, one, you can never trust China to do what is "right," but you can count on China doing what is in its own interest, the rest of the world be damned...

Why would the US want to stop this? It gives us a perfect excuse to keep extending our military might into the pacific, including missile interceptor systems, airbases, and naval assets.

China is worried about being "boxed in and contained"... they should be! With friends like North Korea it gives the United States a free hand to do whatever we want in the region in the name of global security. You would think that China wouldn't be the most thrilled with North Korea over that.

You very well may be correct and as I stated from the beginning of my initial post is I do not claim to be an expert on this subject. However, if one were to look at China's actions in the past decade, they have behaved like the prom queen knowing that a handjob is enough to make you forget about her blowing the captain of the football team.

How much longer will the US be useful to China? Yes we are the largest economy in the world, but China's efforts in emerging markets could more than offset the potential loss to our markets should the US try to play hard ball. Add to the mix China owns almost $2 Trillion in US debt and can tease the opportunity for US companies to have an opportunity to sell in the mainland and I could easily see how China could feel they were in a position of strength when dealing with the US re: North Korea.

While I could be wrong, there are only two certainties, one, you can never trust China to do what is "right," but you can count on China doing what is in its own interest, the rest of the world be damned...

Fireproof:Here's a question: If we have a war with NK, how are we going to get the money for it? Borrow it from China?

It'd be mostly an air campaign. Destroy their SK border artillery batteries and their capitol from the air and have the SKs and Chinese maintain the borders.

Once their border artillery batteries are destroyed, the Air Force can bomb the capitol into rubble at their leisure. NK's air defenses are based on 1950's tech and none of it has the range to hit the high altitude bombers we use today.

Then we let the Chinese move in. They'd never let us take NK, anyways.

It goes on about how most everybody believes that Lil' Kim has no way of mounting an effective nuke warhead on any ballistic delivery that could reach the States.

Then it quotes the SecDef as announcing that, nope, "now they have delivery capacity," and we need to be all frightened and shiat.

Nothing makes me more apathetic about crap like this than the Pentagon stroking itself while behind the scenes it gets an even bigger shopping list ready along with pre-made reasons to use everything on that shopping list.

Lusiphur:Giltric: If I was China I would use NK to start an engagement with the US and then decimate the US in an all or nothing war.

That's silly, because that war would end with the world an unusable, burnt cinder, and all civilization reduced to grunting and painting on cave walls with chalk. Also, China has no interest in attacking the US. We are far too important to them, economically. Remember, they need us a WHOLE lot more than we need them.

What China SHOULD do is invade North Korea. This might sound crazy, but is actually a perfect solution to all of the major problems China is facing right now:

1) Overpopulation of young adult males. If instead of using their higher-tech arsenal, they instead start a draft, targeting undesirables - males 18-30 with no education, a poor or non-existent job, and a potential for getting restless at home - and then send the drafted men on foot into NK with barely enough equipment to have fought the first Korean War and no training, they could get rid of a ton of their unwanted young males. Which leads to...

2) Korean Humanitarian Crisis. If they send those poorly armed, angry, violent young men with no futures into North Korea, they could effectively get them to slaughter a large percentage of the native population. Especially since most of the native population is technically in the reserve, anyway. China is good enough at locking down on critics, foreign and domestic, and powerfule enough, that they could get away with this without suffering any serious backlash from the international community. After all, who's going to impose sanctions on China today? And since they have a permanent veto at the UN, they are essentially above any kind of real reproach or punishment. Wiping out most of the NK citizens eliminates the threat of "the worlds biggest humanitarian crisis", as so many people like to call it. This, in turn, opens the door to...

Kind of a wonky approach, militarily speaking. But, you're spot on about China's economics and the wealth laying in NK territory. The only problem is 'getting to it' will take a lot of initial investment. A decade or more and untold millions, if not billions to modernize NK's mining operations to the point of being able to get at their RRE wealth.

China 'could' do it, but it's a massive long-term investment in a country that isn't their's AND they have cultural issues regarding the Korean people in general.

In short, it'd be a mess, but doable. I don't see them annexing NK until they have no other choice, and that's yet another reason why China is not happy with NK. They're forcing the issue.

fark YES!!!!! I cannot wait to do IT contracts for the US military in the wastelands of North Korea. I bet those skinny little NK women would blow you for a power bar or a pint of milk. ( easily had for free at the D-fac.).

Bontesla:Girion47: Bontesla: Girion47: Bontesla: Girion47: Bontesla: Girion47: Bontesla: jjwars1: Bontesla: The more he moves toward war - the more I'm thinking that he had something up his sleeve.

Yeah, I have that same feeling. It seems most everyone here thinks this is some opportunity to laugh and joke about the situation by mocking N. Korea. I don't think they should underestimate Korea's capabilities though. If I were ruling an underdog nation I would purposefully mislead intelligence, build allies, make myself and the country look weak and incapable, build an arsenal on foreign and domestic soil, and launch an attack on my enemies infrastructure, kill the Internet, release airborn biological weapons, chemical, and nukes from outside my own country.

Agreed. Even if they don't have nuclear capabilities - they certainly have the potential to inflict damage. Lil Kim was educated in what - Switzerland? He's had exposure beyond his little bubble.

Either he's truly the world's worst poker player or we're underestimating him.

And certainly - he's got to know that they would not survive (as a country) in this conflict.

If this were a novel - I would be writing that Lil Kim is looking to either hide or expose something heinous. Perhaps Lil Kim has gotten word that his administration is being investigated for a genocide and a war is a really great way to get other people to destroy damning evidence?

Wouldn't be a disaster thread without you!

/Got Bonnaroo tix, Macklemore will be there.//Headed down to ATL on Friday, is the Clermont as awesome as claimed?

Oh my goodness! Have an amazing time.I'm sooo envious! Is this your first time in Atlanta??

No it's not my first time there, but it will be my first "vacation" there. I've done the aquarium/CNN HQ and a few restaurants while traveling through, but that was with co-workers.

There's this AMAZING place called Porter House. They have like over 800 different beers and the best salt and vinegar popcorn. The menu is onlin ...

somedude210:ha-ha-guy: All out war is not ideal, but really as history has shown to get of an entrenched military dictatorship you at least need to strong encourage them to exit stage left. You can buy off some of them, but you at least need the threat of a bombing campaign to really have them move. Depending on how crazy they really are, one or two might need to get a visit from Mr. JDAM to convince the others to leave.

I honestly think that if Kim was allowed to rule without the Generals around, he could actually reform the country and open relations with the outside world. But for that to happen, we need to oust the Generals

Think Emperor Hirohito post-war japan. Something like that. Keep Kim as ruler but make NK neutered militarily and open trade relations with it. Do so as a joint US/China effort and we could quell most tensions in East Asia for 15-20 years.

North Korea prides itself on its military might and size. Wouldn't your proposal of neutering them increase tensions?

iheartscotch:Exactly, mein Fürher; excuse me, Dear Leader. It is not only possible, it is essential. That is the whole idea of this machine, you know. Deterrence is the art of producing in the mind of the enemy... the fear to attack. And so, because of the automated and irrevocable decision making process which rules out human meddling, the doomsday machine is terrifying. It's simple to understand. And completely credible, and convincing

Yes, but what good is a doomsday device if you don't tell anyone about it?!?!!

Infernalist:bluorangefyre: Wolfling: This is China's place...they need to intervene and just take over in NK. If they really want to be a world power, this is the price they have to pay...you keep order in your own backyard...

Quite frankly, I think China is the one turning the key in Un's back. Their leaders must be ROFLing about all this. Look at it from their perspective... Duhmerica will step in and eliminate the NK leadership structure, destabilise the country for 10 years - who cares? In the meantime, they'll get to closely study the latest in American Nuke defense and stealth technology, right on their own doorstep. In terms of testing their equipment, it couldn't get any better... and I think you can safely trust that plenty of current Chinese equipment will be tested from within NK's borders.

BUT what if we don't take the nukular bait and just bomb them with conventional weapons? Really that's all it'd take if 99% of the country has no electricity.

Take that one step further. China has NO desire to see American troops pour over into NK. If NK kicks over a war, that's exactly what happens...if the Chinese don't do it first.

And they honestly have no desire to have to go in and annex NK into China, but they'd rather do that than see a united Korea under American patronage. NK and its starving masses would be a huge drain on the Chinese economy.

Granted, if they threw a ton of money at NK after it was annexed, they could eventually reap the benefits of their RRE wealth, but that's at least 10 years of heavy infrastructure rebuilding down the road.

If you look at all the facts, you'll see that China is just as mad about this as we are, but for their own reasons. NK is supposed to be the loudly barking dog that never bites. And it's trying to slip its leash and bite someone with a big gun.

somedude210:ha-ha-guy: We could get Jeb, the Bushes are good at starting wars at least. Really as long as Obama gets China on our side, it is fine if some Republican actually pulls the trigger.

no, getting China on our side is a terrible pretense for war. We need them to quell it and maybe overthrow the Kim Clan and rebuild NK with the help of us, SK and Japan. NK will be the true test of global nations to actually rebuild a country into a well-adjusted teenage country.

We can get rid of the leadership in NK without having to resort to war. It's just going to take a while and possibly some concessions to China

All out war is not ideal, but really as history has shown to get of an entrenched military dictatorship you at least need to strong encourage them to exit stage left. You can buy off some of them, but you at least need the threat of a bombing campaign to really have them move. Depending on how crazy they really are, one or two might need to get a visit from Mr. JDAM to convince the others to leave.

Bontesla:Girion47: Bontesla: Girion47: Bontesla: Girion47: Bontesla: jjwars1: Bontesla: The more he moves toward war - the more I'm thinking that he had something up his sleeve.

Yeah, I have that same feeling. It seems most everyone here thinks this is some opportunity to laugh and joke about the situation by mocking N. Korea. I don't think they should underestimate Korea's capabilities though. If I were ruling an underdog nation I would purposefully mislead intelligence, build allies, make myself and the country look weak and incapable, build an arsenal on foreign and domestic soil, and launch an attack on my enemies infrastructure, kill the Internet, release airborn biological weapons, chemical, and nukes from outside my own country.

Agreed. Even if they don't have nuclear capabilities - they certainly have the potential to inflict damage. Lil Kim was educated in what - Switzerland? He's had exposure beyond his little bubble.

Either he's truly the world's worst poker player or we're underestimating him.

And certainly - he's got to know that they would not survive (as a country) in this conflict.

If this were a novel - I would be writing that Lil Kim is looking to either hide or expose something heinous. Perhaps Lil Kim has gotten word that his administration is being investigated for a genocide and a war is a really great way to get other people to destroy damning evidence?

Wouldn't be a disaster thread without you!

/Got Bonnaroo tix, Macklemore will be there.//Headed down to ATL on Friday, is the Clermont as awesome as claimed?

Oh my goodness! Have an amazing time.I'm sooo envious! Is this your first time in Atlanta??

No it's not my first time there, but it will be my first "vacation" there. I've done the aquarium/CNN HQ and a few restaurants while traveling through, but that was with co-workers.

There's this AMAZING place called Porter House. They have like over 800 different beers and the best salt and vinegar popcorn. The menu is online. If you have time ...

By the way, today is a holiday in China (ancestor remembrance day). Fatty the Third is making a lot of Chinese officials come in to work when they're supposed to at the graves of their ancestors. That's not going to win him any friends.

ha-ha-guy:We could get Jeb, the Bushes are good at starting wars at least. Really as long as Obama gets China on our side, it is fine if some Republican actually pulls the trigger.

no, getting China on our side is a terrible pretense for war. We need them to quell it and maybe overthrow the Kim Clan and rebuild NK with the help of us, SK and Japan. NK will be the true test of global nations to actually rebuild a country into a well-adjusted teenage country.

We can get rid of the leadership in NK without having to resort to war. It's just going to take a while and possibly some concessions to China

bluorangefyre:Wolfling: This is China's place...they need to intervene and just take over in NK. If they really want to be a world power, this is the price they have to pay...you keep order in your own backyard...

Quite frankly, I think China is the one turning the key in Un's back. Their leaders must be ROFLing about all this. Look at it from their perspective... Duhmerica will step in and eliminate the NK leadership structure, destabilise the country for 10 years - who cares? In the meantime, they'll get to closely study the latest in American Nuke defense and stealth technology, right on their own doorstep. In terms of testing their equipment, it couldn't get any better... and I think you can safely trust that plenty of current Chinese equipment will be tested from within NK's borders.

BUT what if we don't take the nukular bait and just bomb them with conventional weapons? Really that's all it'd take if 99% of the country has no electricity.

Take that one step further. China has NO desire to see American troops pour over into NK. If NK kicks over a war, that's exactly what happens...if the Chinese don't do it first.

And they honestly have no desire to have to go in and annex NK into China, but they'd rather do that than see a united Korea under American patronage. NK and its starving masses would be a huge drain on the Chinese economy.

Granted, if they threw a ton of money at NK after it was annexed, they could eventually reap the benefits of their RRE wealth, but that's at least 10 years of heavy infrastructure rebuilding down the road.

If you look at all the facts, you'll see that China is just as mad about this as we are, but for their own reasons. NK is supposed to be the loudly barking dog that never bites. And it's trying to slip its leash and bite someone with a big gun.

KarmicDisaster:I do have to wonder where they are going with all this bellicose rhetoric. They obviously can't follow up on any of this, and there are no mass troop movements reported, so nothing major is going to happen. It all appears to be for internal consumption, but to what end? I think it is to distract from their upcoming famine, but how long can they keep it up? Could be a run up to a small border skirmish after which they can declare victory, but that could get out of control easily for several reasons. If this is somehow positioning for the usual "return to the table, get food, keep building bombs, that isn't going to work this time, they have crossed the line with their threat, well, actually just saying that they are going to use nuclear weapons.

That's what I keep wondering too. There is no upside for them. How about extortion? They say, We have cargo container sized nukes in three major US cities. Give us 12 trillion dollars.

ahmadinejad: Yesterday, they said they were restarting their reactor.khamenei: Uh-hu,,ahmadinejad: But today, they said they're launching their missile. So, what do they think? Everybody's just gonna wait till they're ready?khamenei: dunno, they're makin' us look normal!ahmadinejad: HA! - - heykhamenei: oh, relax

Wolfling:This is China's place...they need to intervene and just take over in NK. If they really want to be a world power, this is the price they have to pay...you keep order in your own backyard...

Quite frankly, I think China is the one turning the key in Un's back. Their leaders must be ROFLing about all this. Look at it from their perspective... Duhmerica will step in and eliminate the NK leadership structure, destabilise the country for 10 years - who cares? In the meantime, they'll get to closely study the latest in American Nuke defense and stealth technology, right on their own doorstep. In terms of testing their equipment, it couldn't get any better... and I think you can safely trust that plenty of current Chinese equipment will be tested from within NK's borders.

BUT what if we don't take the nukular bait and just bomb them with conventional weapons? Really that's all it'd take if 99% of the country has no electricity.

Bschott007:Infernalist: I used to think that he was doing this strictly to shore up support among the ruling military class. Now...Now I have no clue what that lil bastard is up to.

He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

It's like..He's playing poker and going all-in with a handful of junk cards and we've seen them and he's still insisting that he's got a Royal Straight Full House Flush.

Not that I believe he actually intends to strike but let us not dismiss NK out of hand. They don't need an ICBM. That's cold war thinking.

If they really want to strike the US with nukes, NK just has to have a few cargo ships with the NK equivilant of a SCUD missile tipped with a nuke. Park the cargo ship just off-shore and fire the missiles into the US.

Or instead of missiles, either off-load a nuke into a van and drive the van into a city. BOOM.

Or if the van-attack is too much planning, just explode the nuke on-board the ship while it is docked in a harbor.

Heck, if it's a cargo ship, it is big and not much is going to stop it if they decide to sail that near a heavily populated area of a city's shoreline. I very much doubt law enforcement would be able to respond, let alone stop, a 'run away' cargo ship headed towards the city's shoreline...and the military response time? Laughably slow.

Likely-hood of NK doing this? Small to non-existent. Likely-hood NK is going to attack at all? I'm fairly certain this is just saber-rattling but again, if they wanted to attack the US mainland and be assured of their nukes hitting designated targets, then is is a good way to do so without needing ICBMs.

1) How much outgoing NK cargo do you suppose there is?

2) How much of it do you think is going anywhere near America?

3) What's the likelihood of ANY ship leaving NK not getting covertly searched by at least one interested national power?

4) What's the likelihood of NK shipping their only 'real' defense against total destruction out of the country on a suicide mission?

5) What's the likelihood of this attempt remaining secret?

The 'cargo ship' and 'sub' delivery systems ideas are always nice to envision. It's very Hollywood-esque. But, it's not going to happen like that.

Hollie Maea:To The Escape Zeppelin!: It's like the US, SK and Japan are ignoring the North's insane threats for once and Kim doesn't know what else to do except make a bigger and bigger threats desperately hoping that the US will back down.

I am guessing there is a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes, but I doubt "ignoring" is one of them. I doubt Obama has slept much in the last few days.

Well not ignoring but certainly not catering to their paranoia and desire to be acknowledged as a world power. For example, in years past the US and SK have cancelled military exercises because NK threw a hissy fit. Now it looks like we're going to call their bluff about going to war. They've screamed bloody murder for decades and I think that the world at large has finally had enough and said "shut up".

utah dude:doglover: Sputnik was also something that's never been done before. The North Korean one is something you can look up how to do properly online.

yah cause a country that doesn't have electricity has the internet?

LOLWUT? They may not have much electricity, but Pyongyang is lit up. They have electricity, they have the internet (their own YouTube channel and Twitter), they do have TVs and cable so they can broadcast their 24/7 indoctrination channel to the people.

jpo2269:Get Best Korea to draw Worst Korea and the United States into some form of military involvement in Best Korea and in the name of preventing a refugee crisis, China comes to the rescue of Best Korea potentially dealing the US a humiliating defeat/stalemate... thus providing China an opportunity to move up the super power ladder....

No. China and the US are too tied economically to have that happen. That's one of the great things about Nixon opening the door with China, we don't have to worry about direct war with them due to mutual economic destruction.

I do think that if something were to happen, then China, US/UN, SK and Japan would probably move in as a joint operation to quell Best Korea and either unify the Korean Peninsula or break it up a la Germany ca. 1945

Infernalist:I used to think that he was doing this strictly to shore up support among the ruling military class. Now...Now I have no clue what that lil bastard is up to.

He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

It's like..He's playing poker and going all-in with a handful of junk cards and we've seen them and he's still insisting that he's got a Royal Straight Full House Flush.

Not that I believe he actually intends to strike but let us not dismiss NK out of hand. They don't need an ICBM. That's cold war thinking.

If they really want to strike the US with nukes, NK just has to have a few cargo ships with the NK equivilant of a SCUD missile tipped with a nuke. Park the cargo ship just off-shore and fire the missiles into the US.

Or instead of missiles, either off-load a nuke into a van and drive the van into a city. BOOM.

Or if the van-attack is too much planning, just explode the nuke on-board the ship while it is docked in a harbor.

Heck, if it's a cargo ship, it is big and not much is going to stop it if they decide to sail that near a heavily populated area of a city's shoreline. I very much doubt law enforcement would be able to respond, let alone stop, a 'run away' cargo ship headed towards the city's shoreline...and the military response time? Laughably slow.

Likely-hood of NK doing this? Small to non-existent. Likely-hood NK is going to attack at all? I'm fairly certain this is just saber-rattling but again, if they wanted to attack the US mainland and be assured of their nukes hitting designated targets, then is is a good way to do so without needing ICBMs.

To The Escape Zeppelin!:It's like the US, SK and Japan are ignoring the North's insane threats for once and Kim doesn't know what else to do except make a bigger and bigger threats desperately hoping that the US will back down.

He may be hoping that China will step in with some food aid. Kind of the Chinese coming and saying "Stop drawing the eye of Sauron over here you fat worthless fark" as they drop off a trainload of rice.

For America that is actually a potential big win. Standard operating procedure right now is for the ROK, US and Japan to make with the aid whenever North Korea waves their dick around. North Korea realizes it is short on food, does some military posturing and then agrees to calm down in exchange for food. If we refuse to provide any aid, either the regime collapses when everyone starves or China has to pick up 100% of the tab. Wait another 5 years until is sick of paying that tab on a yearly basis, propose an agreement to remove Fatty the Third and see if China's approves.

To The Escape Zeppelin!:It's like the US, SK and Japan are ignoring the North's insane threats for once and Kim doesn't know what else to do except make a bigger and bigger threats desperately hoping that the US will back down.

I am guessing there is a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes, but I doubt "ignoring" is one of them. I doubt Obama has slept much in the last few days.

GreenSun:Come on USA, let's just liberate North Korea! They might not have oil, but think of all the kimchi and rice plus barbeque pork that we can "develop"! Better to take their kimchi, rice, and pork now than get blasted by nuclear bombs!

Lets not forget the 3 to 6 trillion in mineral wealth they are sitting on and unable to bring to market.

Suppose Kim-Jong-Un wants to leave Best Korea and live in the Western world. He's basically been forced into a life that perhaps he never really wanted. How would he possibly be able to get out of that life? How about force the military to launch a bloodless coup that allows him and his perky wife to leave Korea and live a life of ease in China. All he'd have to do is act so recklessly that the military would decide that he is no longer stable.

Bontesla:Girion47: Bontesla: jjwars1: Bontesla: The more he moves toward war - the more I'm thinking that he had something up his sleeve.

Yeah, I have that same feeling. It seems most everyone here thinks this is some opportunity to laugh and joke about the situation by mocking N. Korea. I don't think they should underestimate Korea's capabilities though. If I were ruling an underdog nation I would purposefully mislead intelligence, build allies, make myself and the country look weak and incapable, build an arsenal on foreign and domestic soil, and launch an attack on my enemies infrastructure, kill the Internet, release airborn biological weapons, chemical, and nukes from outside my own country.

Agreed. Even if they don't have nuclear capabilities - they certainly have the potential to inflict damage. Lil Kim was educated in what - Switzerland? He's had exposure beyond his little bubble.

Either he's truly the world's worst poker player or we're underestimating him.

And certainly - he's got to know that they would not survive (as a country) in this conflict.

If this were a novel - I would be writing that Lil Kim is looking to either hide or expose something heinous. Perhaps Lil Kim has gotten word that his administration is being investigated for a genocide and a war is a really great way to get other people to destroy damning evidence?

Wouldn't be a disaster thread without you!

/Got Bonnaroo tix, Macklemore will be there.//Headed down to ATL on Friday, is the Clermont as awesome as claimed?

Oh my goodness! Have an amazing time.I'm sooo envious! Is this your first time in Atlanta??

No it's not my first time there, but it will be my first "vacation" there. I've done the aquarium/CNN HQ and a few restaurants while traveling through, but that was with co-workers.

Lost Thought 00:In the most technical sense of that term. It had a lower orbit than Sputnik

The North Korean satellite's current orbit is about 100 km above the International Space Station. Sputnik did have a higher apogee but its orbit was elliptical with a perigee of only 215 km (according to Wikipedia). Sputnik re-entered the atmosphere after 3 months and the Korean satellite is coming up on 4.

Bontesla:jjwars1: Bontesla: The more he moves toward war - the more I'm thinking that he had something up his sleeve.

Yeah, I have that same feeling. It seems most everyone here thinks this is some opportunity to laugh and joke about the situation by mocking N. Korea. I don't think they should underestimate Korea's capabilities though. If I were ruling an underdog nation I would purposefully mislead intelligence, build allies, make myself and the country look weak and incapable, build an arsenal on foreign and domestic soil, and launch an attack on my enemies infrastructure, kill the Internet, release airborn biological weapons, chemical, and nukes from outside my own country.

Agreed. Even if they don't have nuclear capabilities - they certainly have the potential to inflict damage. Lil Kim was educated in what - Switzerland? He's had exposure beyond his little bubble.

Either he's truly the world's worst poker player or we're underestimating him.

And certainly - he's got to know that they would not survive (as a country) in this conflict.

If this were a novel - I would be writing that Lil Kim is looking to either hide or expose something heinous. Perhaps Lil Kim has gotten word that his administration is being investigated for a genocide and a war is a really great way to get other people to destroy damning evidence?

Wouldn't be a disaster thread without you!

/Got Bonnaroo tix, Macklemore will be there.//Headed down to ATL on Friday, is the Clermont as awesome as claimed?

Gosling:Infernalist: I used to think that he was doing this strictly to shore up support among the ruling military class. Now...Now I have no clue what that lil bastard is up to.

He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

It's like..He's playing poker and going all-in with a handful of junk cards and we've seen them and he's still insisting that he's got a Royal Straight Full House Flush.

Right now? I think he might actually farking do it. And if he does, well, we pretty much have no choice but to just end this.

Nah, there has been a lot of bluster, but it's still just a show for internal consumption. He might torpedo another patrol boat, but there will be no large scale conventional or nuclear attack by the North.They are crazy, and stupid, but they aren't that crazy and stupid.

TalenLee:Giltric: TalenLee: Infernalist: He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

You forget that if Pyongyang launches a rocket that leaves eyesight, NK will tell everyone in NK that New York is now a smoking crater in the ground. They can't really be humiliated in this front because they have no international standing amongst the aware and alert. The biggest nuke NK can field could not destroy New York City with a direct hit.

they don't have to destroy anything....just have to make it uninhabitable with fallout....thats what the whole dirty nuke/bomb thing was about in the current war on terror.

Well, given that we're talking about America, if they successfully blow up some buildings with box cutters, you'll all lose your goddamn mind and invade Belgium, so I suppose they have ways to maximise their side effects.

Well, as we have seen since then, the passengers aren't going to put up with that crap (shoebomber, underwear bomber, any number of unruly people who have been tied to their seats) but Homeland Security and the TSA haven't stopped growing since then so there might be a point to your hyperbole.

I can no longer sit back and allow communist infiltration, communist indoctrination, communist subversion, and the international communist conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids.

jjwars1:Bontesla: The more he moves toward war - the more I'm thinking that he had something up his sleeve.

Yeah, I have that same feeling. It seems most everyone here thinks this is some opportunity to laugh and joke about the situation by mocking N. Korea. I don't think they should underestimate Korea's capabilities though. If I were ruling an underdog nation I would purposefully mislead intelligence, build allies, make myself and the country look weak and incapable, build an arsenal on foreign and domestic soil, and launch an attack on my enemies infrastructure, kill the Internet, release airborn biological weapons, chemical, and nukes from outside my own country.

Agreed. Even if they don't have nuclear capabilities - they certainly have the potential to inflict damage. Lil Kim was educated in what - Switzerland? He's had exposure beyond his little bubble.

Either he's truly the world's worst poker player or we're underestimating him.

And certainly - he's got to know that they would not survive (as a country) in this conflict.

If this were a novel - I would be writing that Lil Kim is looking to either hide or expose something heinous. Perhaps Lil Kim has gotten word that his administration is being investigated for a genocide and a war is a really great way to get other people to destroy damning evidence?

Ambivalence:The U.S. is not going to nuke china's pet yorkie no matter how hard it bites us. It's not NK we need to worry about upsetting, it's China. There will be no nukes and we don't need them. NK isn't strong enough to withstand an even moderate conventional assault from U.S./SK and allies.

Besides if things come to that I have to believe that China will deal with it rather than let the US move it's forces that close to the border.

TalenLee:Infernalist: He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

You forget that if Pyongyang launches a rocket that leaves eyesight, NK will tell everyone in NK that New York is now a smoking crater in the ground. They can't really be humiliated in this front because they have no international standing amongst the aware and alert. The biggest nuke NK can field could not destroy New York City with a direct hit.

they don't have to destroy anything....just have to make it uninhabitable with fallout....thats what the whole dirty nuke/bomb thing was about in the current war on terror.

Skeptos:Guntram Shatterhand: I'm curious how China is going to react to this. NK is probably making their lives very difficult right now, it's either shiat or get off the pot. Keeping America pissed at this sad dictatorship can't be good for business.

I don't see Kim Jong-Un lasting long, no matter what occurs.

One thing we can be pretty sure of is that China doesn't want another US ally on its border. If I were Xi I'd be thinking of a pre-emptive occupation of the north (and deposition of the Kims).

This. They know we won't go in unless provoked and if we were provoked that it will be over before they could even pick up the phone.

Marshal805:If you seriously think America wouldn't retaliate to a nuclear strike with one of it's own because we might get bad PR, you're an idiot.

The U.S. is not going to nuke china's pet yorkie no matter how hard it bites us. It's not NK we need to worry about upsetting, it's China. There will be no nukes and we don't need them. NK isn't strong enough to withstand an even moderate conventional assault from U.S./SK and allies.

ClavellBCMI:Giltric: ClavellBCMI: Assuming Best Korea's Troll-In-Chief actually *has* nukes to spare to throw at someone, and assuming he actually has a missile to attach them to that can fly further than 1,000km, and assuming he has a guidance system that can actually allow a warhead to come within 5km of his intended target, he *might* actually be able to cause some damage... right before we turn Best Korea into the World's Biggest Glass-Covered Self-Lighting Parking Lot.

We lost face on the world stage when Bush invaded Iraq.

Do we get another peace prize when we incinerate millions of Nork civillians?

Is it a different because Obama is black?

No, it is not different, it is probably not the correct response, but if Kim Jong-Un does throw even a single nuke at anyone, the response will be the Total Annihilation of North Korea, whether we like it or not.

The only thing keeping China from being the worlds only economic and military superpower is the US currently being at the top of the pyramid.

If I was China I would use NK to start an engagement with the US and then decimate the US in an all or nothing war.

A war like that with the resources and minerals of the US as a prize would be worth losing a couple hundred million loyal surplus males....because a war for resources will have to happen eventually...might as well be now.

I saw some article speculating this is all trying to stop a coup from happening, but I don't understand how this would stop a coup either.

Right now, Kim is not personally responsible for any of the atrocities and human rights violations going on in Best Korea (in that he didn't order them, he's just perpetuating them). His generals and advisors, however, are. If Kim wants to make things better and normalize relations with the West, everyone else gets to stand in front of the Hague, and they know it--so if Kim HAS been making such noises, the generals have likewise been making noises to the effect of "Nice lifestyle you got here, 'Dear Leader', shame if anything happened to it."

OTOH, if Kim starts a war he knows he has to lose, he can surrender to the US on his own terms, which would include throwing his loyal generals under an Abrams tank (literally or figuratively, doesn't much matter) while he keeps his pudgy head intact. It's a win-win for him at this point.

Assuming your hypothetical scenerio is true, I would think the generals would easily sense his plot and murder him first.

Wizard Drongo:I think at this point the only thing stopping North Korea from being a large flat sheet of volcanic glass is the worry that China might step in.

NK has nukes. It is threatening to use them (allbeit we all know they'd be hard pressed to launch them 5 feet!) agains the west (The US, South Korea, Japan - so I'm fine!)....all we need is some divvy private taking a potshot to give the US casus beli and it's GO TIME.

But, as I said, the Chinese would likely intervene, now you've got two nuclear states (who can launch at each other) looking down the barrel of their ICBM's...

This is China's place...they need to intervene and just take over in NK. If they really want to be a world power, this is the price they have to pay...you keep order in your own backyard...

Giltric:ClavellBCMI: Assuming Best Korea's Troll-In-Chief actually *has* nukes to spare to throw at someone, and assuming he actually has a missile to attach them to that can fly further than 1,000km, and assuming he has a guidance system that can actually allow a warhead to come within 5km of his intended target, he *might* actually be able to cause some damage... right before we turn Best Korea into the World's Biggest Glass-Covered Self-Lighting Parking Lot.

We lost face on the world stage when Bush invaded Iraq.

Do we get another peace prize when we incinerate millions of Nork civillians?

Is it a different because Obama is black?

If you seriously think America wouldn't retaliate to a nuclear strike with one of it's own because we might get bad PR, you're an idiot.

Exactly, mein Fürher; excuse me, Dear Leader. It is not only possible, it is essential. That is the whole idea of this machine, you know. Deterrence is the art of producing in the mind of the enemy... the fear to attack. And so, because of the automated and irrevocable decision making process which rules out human meddling, the doomsday machine is terrifying. It's simple to understand. And completely credible, and convincing

Giltric:ClavellBCMI: Assuming Best Korea's Troll-In-Chief actually *has* nukes to spare to throw at someone, and assuming he actually has a missile to attach them to that can fly further than 1,000km, and assuming he has a guidance system that can actually allow a warhead to come within 5km of his intended target, he *might* actually be able to cause some damage... right before we turn Best Korea into the World's Biggest Glass-Covered Self-Lighting Parking Lot.

We lost face on the world stage when Bush invaded Iraq.

Do we get another peace prize when we incinerate millions of Nork civillians?

Is it a different because Obama is black?

No, it is not different, it is probably not the correct response, but if Kim Jong-Un does throw even a single nuke at anyone, the response will be the Total Annihilation of North Korea, whether we like it or not.

Bontesla:The more he moves toward war - the more I'm thinking that he had something up his sleeve.

Yeah, I have that same feeling. It seems most everyone here thinks this is some opportunity to laugh and joke about the situation by mocking N. Korea. I don't think they should underestimate Korea's capabilities though. If I were ruling an underdog nation I would purposefully mislead intelligence, build allies, make myself and the country look weak and incapable, build an arsenal on foreign and domestic soil, and launch an attack on my enemies infrastructure, kill the Internet, release airborn biological weapons, chemical, and nukes from outside my own country.

This is so farking crazy. Just completely nuts. On one hand there is a good chance it's a bluff... but at the same time if NK does have something up it's sleeve they are crazy enough to use it. I hope it is a bluff otherwise a lot of people are going to die, lots of people in Seoul and alot of poor brainwashed North Koreans. And the rebuilding of NK would make Iraq look like putting up a plastic playground.

ClavellBCMI:Assuming Best Korea's Troll-In-Chief actually *has* nukes to spare to throw at someone, and assuming he actually has a missile to attach them to that can fly further than 1,000km, and assuming he has a guidance system that can actually allow a warhead to come within 5km of his intended target, he *might* actually be able to cause some damage... right before we turn Best Korea into the World's Biggest Glass-Covered Self-Lighting Parking Lot.

We lost face on the world stage when Bush invaded Iraq.

Do we get another peace prize when we incinerate millions of Nork civillians?

Assuming Best Korea's Troll-In-Chief actually *has* nukes to spare to throw at someone, and assuming he actually has a missile to attach them to that can fly further than 1,000km, and assuming he has a guidance system that can actually allow a warhead to come within 5km of his intended target, he *might* actually be able to cause some damage... right before we turn Best Korea into the World's Biggest Glass-Covered Self-Lighting Parking Lot.

Mr.Poops:I actually wouldn't mind seeing them try. Heck, the US should even give them a 3 day advance warning of their attack, so that every man, woman and child has the chance to flee the country before it's razed to the ground.

They won't raze the whole country, just the capital. There really isn't anything else of significance besides empty farms and starving peasants.

dameron:My fear is that he'll float a nuke into the port of Long Beach. I have no doubt they could do this. This is exactly the scenario Oppenheimer presented to Congress back in 1945.

<i>Sen. Millikin: We... have mine-detecting devices, which are rather effective... I was wondering if anything of that kind might be available to use as a defense against that particular type of use of atomic bombs.

Dr. Oppenheimer: If you hired me to walk through the cellars of Washington to see whether there were atomic bombs, I think my most important tool would be a screwdriver to open the crates and look. I think that just walking by, swinging a little gadget would not give me the information </i>

It'd be REALLY hard to find a well hidden atomic bomb. Even given 1940's technology, the radioactive plutonium core of an implosion type bomb would weight less than 20 pounds.

This, this is the only thing that has me concerned.

They can't get a missle over here, but a warhead in the cargo hold of some shiatball oil fired freighter?

I actually wouldn't mind seeing them try. Heck, the US should even give them a 3 day advance warning of their attack, so that every man, woman and child has the chance to flee the country before it's razed to the ground.

Red Shirt Blues:GAT_00: Red Shirt Blues: SnakeLee: GAT_00: Eisenhower openly considered ending the Korean war with nukes. He thought it was a cheap way to wage war.

Wow I just read up and I stand corrected. It's weird that what I just referenced was a talking point that was discredited 25 years before I was even born, yet I remember at least one teacher in high school giving a whole lesson it.

I'm very curious. What are you saying was a disproved talking point?

Yeah, I can't quite follow what he's talking about either.

To back myself up, the directive in question was NSC 162/2. It was a directive to treat nukes the same as any other weapon in a war.

I think in his original post he was inferring that Mac wanted to use the bomb. Although he was authorized to use it he never requested it.

Yeah! I thought this thread was going to be redlit so I made a lazy joke. I had always heard that MacArthur wanted to use nukes in Korea, but Truman said no and relieved him of duty for pushing for it. It turns out that other people wanted to use Nukes and Truman authorized mobilizing them, but MacArthur was against it. It somehow got leaked to the press that it was the other way around and MacArthur was the one pushing for nukes - I am not sure if it was just bad information or they were intentionally trying to discredit him. Anyways, he had to testify against it a bunch to Congress and was ultimately exonerated. Pretty interesting Wikipedia entry although I just kind of skimmed it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_Truman%27s_relief_of_General_D o uglas_MacArthur

oldfarthenry:This is like recess with the special-needs kid in his wheelchair ramming the sports jock in the ankles.If the jock punches Timmy in the face he's deemed a bully. If he does nothing Timmy will pinch his nuts with his reaching stick.

There's no easy way out of this.

This is quite possibly the best and most accurate description of this situation that I've read to date.

nekom:Oh he can always stand down and claim to his people that the enemy has stood down in utter fear of their awesome armed forces. Unless he pushes just over the edge and shiat gets real. Then it'll be a matter of hours before DPRK as en entity is de facto gone.

Indeed - the only question is whether or not the U.S. does it or China rolls in and does it for us.

Red Shirt Blues:SnakeLee: GAT_00: Eisenhower openly considered ending the Korean war with nukes. He thought it was a cheap way to wage war.

Wow I just read up and I stand corrected. It's weird that what I just referenced was a talking point that was discredited 25 years before I was even born, yet I remember at least one teacher in high school giving a whole lesson it.

I'm very curious. What are you saying was a disproved talking point?

Yeah, I can't quite follow what he's talking about either.

To back myself up, the directive in question was NSC 162/2. It was a directive to treat nukes the same as any other weapon in a war.

My fear is that he'll float a nuke into the port of Long Beach. I have no doubt they could do this. This is exactly the scenario Oppenheimer presented to Congress back in 1945.

<i>Sen. Millikin: We... have mine-detecting devices, which are rather effective... I was wondering if anything of that kind might be available to use as a defense against that particular type of use of atomic bombs.

Dr. Oppenheimer: If you hired me to walk through the cellars of Washington to see whether there were atomic bombs, I think my most important tool would be a screwdriver to open the crates and look. I think that just walking by, swinging a little gadget would not give me the information </i>

It'd be REALLY hard to find a well hidden atomic bomb. Even given 1940's technology, the radioactive plutonium core of an implosion type bomb would weight less than 20 pounds.

Iranian missile tech seems better than NorK's and they have been sharing tech with them...I wonder if they do have a better delivery system (Iranian-supplied) than their recent tests have suggested....

We'd have long since seen signs of it. Plus, those missiles don't exactly run on diesel fuel. It'd be hard enough to build on their own, and it'd be impossible for them to build them in secret without us knowing.

Infernalist:I used to think that he was doing this strictly to shore up support among the ruling military class. Now...Now I have no clue what that lil bastard is up to.

He can't be serious. We all know he can't hit the U.S. How can this possibly end, except in humiliation for NK?

It's like..He's playing poker and going all-in with a handful of junk cards and we've seen them and he's still insisting that he's got a Royal Straight Full House Flush.

Oh he can always stand down and claim to his people that the enemy has stood down in utter fear of their awesome armed forces. Unless he pushes just over the edge and shiat gets real. Then it'll be a matter of hours before DPRK as en entity is de facto gone.